FEMU based identification of the creep behavior of Zircaloy-4 claddings under simulated RIA thermo-mechanical conditions

This study aims to identify the creep behavior of Zircaloy-4 fuel claddings under simulated reactivity initiated accident (RIA) thermo-mechanical conditions. In a previous work ballooning creep tests performed in simulated RIA conditions were described. A challenge to overcome when analyzing these e...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of nuclear materials 2022-04, Vol.561, p.153542, Article 153542
Main Authors: Jailin, T., Tardif, N., Desquines, J., Chaudet, P., Coret, M., Baietto, M.-C., Georgenthum, V.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Beta phase
Boundary conditions
Cameras
Creep
Creep tests
Deformation effects
Engineering Sciences
FEMU
Finite element method
Full-field measurements
Grain growth
High temperature
Identification
Mathematical models
Mechanical properties
Model updating
Phase transitions
RIA
Simulation
Zircaloy-4
Zircaloys (trademark)
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Summary:This study aims to identify the creep behavior of Zircaloy-4 fuel claddings under simulated reactivity initiated accident (RIA) thermo-mechanical conditions. In a previous work ballooning creep tests performed in simulated RIA conditions were described. A challenge to overcome when analyzing these experiments is that ballooning tests imply structural effects during the deformation of the specimen that have to be taken into account to identify the creep behavior of the material. In this paper a FEMU (finite element model updating) based identification is proposed to identify the creep law of the cladding, weakly coupled to the phase transformation of the material at high temperatures. Since the loading conditions are solely known in the part of the optical field of the cameras used for stereocorrelation, only this region is modeled using a Love-Kirchhoff assumption to impose the boundary conditions through the sample thickness. A Norton creep law, whose parameters are expressed as a function of the β phase fraction in the material, is identified and reproduces the first 10 s of the experiments with mean errors on the radial displacement rates of about 10%. Finally, an extension to higher time scale is proposed in Norton’s law to model the non linearity in the material response by taking into account the grain growth contribution.
ISSN:0022-3115
1873-4820
DOI:10.1016/j.jnucmat.2022.153542